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Tony Isabella, the creator of Black Lightning is actually a good friend of mine. Tony was writer for Luke Cage, one of the The Defenders, which premieres on Netflix this month. Tony just invited me to come to the grand premier next Friday. So I have been following black lightning for years! And I will post and show pictures tomorrow.
I asked Tony to work on a new project called Jewish lightning. His only weakness Is that someone has to come in on Saturday to turn on his lightning.

The actual back story of Black Lightning is almost as interesting as the comic.
Since the early 1960sMarvel had often used black* characters in their stories and introduced the Black Panther in 1966. Soon the Falcon and many others followed. In 1972 Marvel published the first national comic with a black lead, Luke Cage. Some of those stories were written by Tony Isabella. Tonywas the writer on Marvel’s second black super hero title, Black Goliath. Tony also wrote Daredevil, Ghost Rider and so many more titles.
I cannot tell you what the heck was going on a DC in 1976. Their idea of a black super-hero was to take a bigoted white man, who, like the Hulk, when he got angry, turned into a black super-hero.
Tony, now at DC, would have none of this. So he created, and even designed from scratch, Jefferson Pierce, Black Lightning. What is so important about this character, and much of Tony’s work, is there is a strong morality behind it. That is, Pierce was a married man with children who cared about his neighborhood which was no longer safe. There was always a strong moral background to Tony’s tales. Tony did the first eight or so issues. Then he returned, twenty years later to revitalize the character and wrote some of the best comics ever. REALLY! Pierce originally had no superpowers but created a belt that generated electrical bolts and a force field. Comic book writers have since learned that fans want their heroes to have actually powers so that changed in time and BL gained powers.
The character got his name from a quote from the 15th century’s Milo Sweetman, "Justice, like lightning, should ever appear to some men hope, to other men fear."
I know only of Tony’s BL but the character has been used in many ways since by D.C. Tony told me that he has met with the writers of the show and he was happy how they are handling it. It will not yet be an interactive part of the DC TV universe because it will deal will more real issues and events.
Honestly, if Tony likes it, it means that they are sticking close to his original concepts which we need more of these days.
*In sci-fi I use the term black instead of African-American. This is because many characters are not only NOT American, but may not be from this Earth.

In Tony's book, "1,000 Comics You Must Read" I am mentioned in the dedication.

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